Luc Leestemaker was a painter of space – increasingly, of pure space. Leestemaker anchors us on earth by composing each landscape painting around a horizon line; but for that, we could be adrift in the cosmos. Around that horizon he confabulates an atmosphere of rich, tempered pigment, of nuanced color, of light captured and diffused, of what can finally only be described as breathable paint.

These are the least specific landscapes (or, if you would, seascapes) possible, and yet, or perhaps as a result, we recognize in them so many places we know, or at least remember – recognize them almost, but not quite, to the point of naming them. These could be depictions of foggy days, afternoons at the shore, views from heights shrouded in clouds; but more accurately, they are recollections of such scenes and moments, impressions of impressions, themselves robbed of detail by the vagaries of memory. Leestemaker’s landscape paintings challenge us not only to identify where we are, but ask us to think about where we’ve been. And then, with the palpability of that rich paint, they draw us forward, further amplifying the question: Where are we going?